Tuesday, 31 December 2013

C-FAM (the Catholic and Family Human Rights Institute)
exists to defend life and family at international institutions and to
publicise the debate.

Its vision is to preserve
international law by discrediting socially radical policies at the United
Nations and other international institutions.

An essential part of C-FAM’s work is each week to publish
the Friday Fax,
prepared by C-FAM staff members who attend UN meetings and conferences as well
as closely reading numerous UN documents.

The Friday Fax, now in its fourteenth year of uninterrupted
publication, is read by over 400,000 subscribers
and readers around the world.

Friday Fax has just published its ‘bottom
five’, the global abortion lobby’s greatest victories of 2013.

These will be of interest to everyone with an interest in
how pro-abortion factions are working at the highest international level to
promote abortion throughout the world with the assistance of national governments
and global corporate leaders.

I have included the links which provide further background information:

As nations perform a 20-year review of population policies that include family
planning and abortion, the agency in charge of the review has put abortion
groups at the helm. They want countries to spend more money on policies that
have an overall effect of reducing populations. Governments spent $60 billion
last year on population policies that originated at the 1994 Cairo Conference
on Population and Development. Recipients of that money include the United
Nations Population Fund, International Planned Parenthood Federation, Marie
Stopes International, Ipas, and groups that promote abortion, contraception and
sterilization as a panacea for the world’s problems.

3. France and the UK
Enact Homosexual Marriage Laws

President Francois Hollande imposed homosexual marriage on
France by seeking to silence opponents and rushing to a vote on the law. But
the French people staged monumental demonstrations, bringing over 1 million people
to the streets of Paris. Families with children, elderly men and women, and
youth were beaten, tear gassed, and jailed – actions for which France was
scolded by the Council of Europe and at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.
This was not so for the Brits. In the United Kingdom marriage defenders were
barely able to muster a whimper as their parliament voted on marriage for
homosexuals.

4. UNICEF Claims
Children Have Right to Confidential Abortion

The UN children’s agency (UNICEF) called on countries to
recognize a right of children to confidential sexual and reproductive health services and
information. They followed the lead of UN “experts” that monitor the
Convention on the Rights of the Child. They say children must have confidential
access to “safe abortion” and the morning after pill among other things. Though
countries may ignore experts, they must pay attention to UN agencies and
programs because they provide money and other forms of aid. Unfortunately,
UNICEF has joined the ranks of those who hold sexual autonomy as the highest
human rights norm.

5. UN Committee Says
Abortion is a Right in Situations of War

The global abortion lobby’s latest
effort is to manufacture a right to abortion for women who are victims
of rape in situations of war. They were at UN headquarters during the annual Commission on the Status of Women in the Spring and
again in the Summer to lobby the UN Security Council, albeit without success. The UN
committee that monitors the UN’s women’s treaty gave abortion groups a lifeline
when it issued a recommendation that abortion is a right in situations of
conflict. The committee’s opinions have no real authority, but abortion groups
and UN staff will tout them as authoritative to pressure governments to change
their laws.

Stefano Gennarini writes
for C-FAM. This article first appeared in
the Friday Fax, an internet report published weekly by C-FAM (Catholic Family
& Human Rights Institute), a New York and Washington DC-based research
institute. This article appears with permission.

Saturday, 21 December 2013

Kiwi cricketer Ross Taylor could
make history today as he takes the field for the final day of the third
test against West Indies.

The Black Caps bowled out the West Indies for 103 in their
second innings in Hamilton yesterday and now just need 116 further runs to
complete a 2-0 series win. They are currently 6 without loss.

Yesterday Taylor
completed his third consecutive Test century making 131 to lead the Black Caps
to 349 all out.

In so doing he became the first New Zealand batsman to score
a century in all three Tests of a three Test series (217, 129 and 131).

Taylor is now just 20
runs short of breaking the New Zealand record of most runs in a three match
series, which was achieved by Andrew Jones when he scored 513 against Sri
Lanka in 1990/91.

The 29-year-old is also just seven
runs shy of breaking the record for the most runs by a New Zealander in a
calendar year - which was accomplished by John Reid when he scored 871 in
1965. But Reid's tally though took three Tests and eight innings more than
Taylor.

Taylor, who yesterday scored his 11th Test ton, is averaging
an incredible 246.5 for this series and 72 for 2013 with one innings almost
certainly to come. So a series average of 250 is not beyond the realms of
possibility.

His total runs for the year also put him fourth
in the international rankings behind only Michael Clarke, Ian Bell and
David Warner. But he has achieved this in just 16 innings, at least six fewer
than any of these three.

Taylor has now scored over
4,000 runs in tests including eleven hundreds and has a test average of
46.52. He also has eight hundreds in ODIs and 16 in first class matches.

He also has a test bowling average of 24 (!), but has actually
bowled only 16 overs in total, taking 2 for 48 overall.

Blogs with the names of well-known people in the title (5,
7, 8, 10, 13, 15, 18) tend to draw a crowd but in fact eleven of my top 25, but
only one of the top ten, deal with homosexuality in one way or another (10, 12, 13, 15, 16,
17, 18, 21, 22, 23, 25).

Do you feel you are just going through the motions this
Christmas spending money on unneeded gifts?

Some friends told me recently that they had given each of their children a £50
allowance to buy Christmas gifts for people living in developing
countries.

Their kids had grasped the opportunity with both hands, putting careful thought
into their purchases, and even adding some of their own savings in an effort to
make a real difference in the lives of those they were seeking to help.

The idea of 'buying a goat for Christmas' is not new but it is amazing to see
the huge variety of other gifts that are now available on line. And for not
much outlay at all.

Here are just a fraction of the gifts on offer.

On the Christian Aid you can
buy a chicken for £9, a goat for £19, a group of ducklings for £25, a month’s
food for a refugee family for £25, a sheep for £55 and a herd of goats for £76.

Samaritan's Purse is
offering a mosquito net for £5, four chickens for £12, a kitchen garden and
tools for £15 and two piglets for £31.

From CBM £15 will provide
sight-saving vitamin A for 50 children, £26 will provide enough Mectizan
tablets to help 40 families for an entire year - stopping the progression of
River Blindness (Onchocerciasis) and freeing them from the associated,
debilitating symptoms. £24 will pay for cataract surgery for an adult.

These are just a few of the hundreds of imaginative options on these sites and
others like Oxfam
and Save
the Children.

Why not make someone you have never met feel special this Christmas?

Jesus
Christ said, 'Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide
purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will
never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.' (Luke 12:33)

Paul
Lamb, 57, was involved in a car accident in 1990, which left him paralysed,
save for limited use of his right hand. He is seeking permission for a doctor
in the UK to prescribe him lethal drugs so that he can take his own life.

‘Martin’,
48, suffered a brainstem stroke in August 2008, the effects of which are
permanent, leaving him virtually unable to move and unable to speak. He can
communicate only through small movements of his head and eyes and is totally
dependent on others for every aspect of his life.

Because of his physical disabilities, ‘Martin’ is unable to
take his own life. He wishes to go to Dignitas to end his life but his wife,
although she wants to be there at the end, is unwilling to take part in any of
the preparation or planning for her husband’s death.

The Director of Public Prosecutions’ guidelines state that a
prosecution is more likely where a ‘professional’ assists a suicide. ‘Martin’
is seeking further clarity from the DPP regarding the likelihood of a doctor or
carer assisting his suicide being prosecuted.

Both Lamb and ‘Martin’ are arguing that the current law
represents a disproportionate and discriminatory interference with their right
to a private and family life under Article 8 of the Human Rights Act, because
it does not allow them to end their lives at a time and in a manner of their
choosing - with the help of a medical professional.

Over the past 24 hours I have done six media interviews on
these cases on behalf of ‘Care Not Killing’– BBC One o’clock news, Channel 5 News,
three BBC regional radio stations and the Radio Four Today programme.

I argued that if the Supreme Court were to accede to either
man’s request this would be a far-reaching legal change that would remove legal
protection from a large number of vulnerable, elderly, and disabled people.

You can listen to the (brief) Radio Four debate with Raymond
Tallis and read a short BBC report on it here. The presenter was Sarah
Montague (pictured).

Because of the death overnight of actor Peter O’Toole, our
0830 slot was bumped to 0855 leaving less than five minutes to deal with these
very complex issues.

This was a matter beyond the presenters’ control and both
Sarah Montague and Evan Davies said afterward that they had wanted to move the
debate onto the concerning developments in other European countries that have
changed the law to allow euthanasia or assisted suicide. They regretted that
there was not time for this.

It is however noteworthy that the Belgian senate has in the
last week voted
to legalise euthanasia for children with terminal illnesses. The Belgian lower
house is expected to offer not opposition to this when it considers it in the spring
of 2014.

It is widely acknowledged that euthanasia is out
of control in Belgium: a 500% increase in cases in ten years; one third
involuntary; half not reported; euthanasia for blindness, anorexia, depression
and a botched sex change operation; organ
transplant euthanasia; and plans to extend euthanasia to children and
people with dementia.

One commentator has said that
Belgium has 'leaped head-first off a moral cliff'.

Call it incremental extension, mission creep or slippery
slope - whatever - it is strongly in evidence in Belgium.

With these two court cases proceeding and two bills due to
be debated in British parliaments next year we should heed the loud warnings
coming from across the English Channel.

Sunday, 15 December 2013

I was interested to read last month in the Daily
Telegraph that more than 750 GPs, surgeons and other doctors had kept their
jobs despite being found guilty of criminal offences.

Of the convictions, 184 were for dangerous driving, 330 for
drink-driving and four for driving under the influence of drugs.

But other convictions included perjury, forgery, fraud,
making threats to kill and violent disorder, including rioting. Also included were
one doctor who took indecent photographs of a child, two with convictions for
possessing child pornography, two for trafficking drugs and three for grievous
bodily harm.

There were 31 offences of assault, three of possessing
dangerous weapons, seven for soliciting prostitutes, a dozen for domestic
violence, and two of child cruelty or neglect.

The report predictably led to protest by patient advocacy
groups. Why was it, they asked, that doctors were able to keep their jobs after
criminal convictions when other professionals weren’t?

But what about doctors who habitually break the law without
being investigated or prosecuted, let alone convicted?

In this connection I was interested to see another Telegraph
article in which the journalist related a conversation she had had with a
friend who was a GP.

The doctor had deliberately falsified an HSA1
abortion authorisation form saying that the patient qualified under ‘ground C’ - mental health - when she most clearly did not.

When the patient, a student, challenged her she explained
that there were no other options to tick to grant her an abortion and that the
reasons given on the form were the only legal grounds for abortion (as
established by the 1967 Abortion Act).

This not surprisingly left the
girl mystified and the GP feeling profoundly uneasy. She had clearly been
breaking the law for some time but had never been challenged about it before.

Ground C reads as
follows:

‘The pregnancy
has NOT exceeded its 24th week and that the continuance of the pregnancy would
involve risk, greater than if the pregnancy were terminated, of injury to the
physical or mental health of the pregnant woman.’

In practice 98% of all abortions in Britain (about 196,000 per year)
are authorised under Ground C and 99.96% of these are under mental health rather than physical health.

But in fact, according to a major
review carried out by the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges in 2011, there
is no evidence that the risk to mental health of continuing a pregnancy is ever
greater than the risk of having an abortion.

So in other words these abortions
are technically
illegal. Furthermore doctors who knowingly or wilfully putting their
signatures to an HSA1 form in the way described are actually committing a form
of perjury (I explain this is much more detail here).

Under the Offences
Against the Person Act 1861 abortion is still a criminal offence carrying a
custodial life sentence, like murder. All the Abortion Act did was to make
abortion legal under certain restricted circumstances.

Under the Perjury Act
1911 falsifying an HSA1 form is a criminal offence which carries a
custodial sentence of up to two years, or a fine, or both.

What happens in practice is that both illegal abortion and
related perjury occur on an industrial scale in Britain.

But the police, prosecutors, the courts, parliament and the
medical profession do nothing about it.

Parliament, police and the courts have always deferred to
doctors in this matter. There has been only one conviction for illegal abortion
since 1967 in almost eight million cases and none, as far as I know, for
perjury.

As a result, close to eight million preborn babies have had
their lives taken by doctors illegally.

As well as being illegal in probably 98% of cases in
Britain, abortion is also contrary to the Hippocratic Oath and was described
by the British Medical Association in 1947 as ‘the greatest crime’.

Last week, in answer to a parliamentary
question from David Burrowes MP, Health Minister Daniel Poulter said that
between 23 February 2012 and 31December 2012 there were
153,335 abortions performed where the grounds involved a risk to the woman's
mental health (notice that the health minister has used wording which is
nowhere found in the Act itself).

So it appears that the CMO’s letter has made not a blind bit
of difference.

I wonder what will happen now?

I suspect, if the last 45 years is any indication, the
answer will be ‘not much’.

There is no one more innocent, more vulnerable and killed in
greater numbers in Britain than the preborn baby. That this is done largely
illegally and that no one with power does anything to stop it is one of the
greatest scandals and travesties of justice of our time.

It also makes doctors the largest group of unapprehended
criminals in the state.

The 750 doctors who are allowed to go on practising despite
having criminal convictions are a drop in the bucket in comparison.

Saturday, 14 December 2013

If you have Down’s syndrome and your mother lives in Ireland then your chances of making it to birth are considerably greater than if you have the
misfortune to be conceived in England or Wales.

English and Welsh women are 7.6 times more likely than Irish
women to have an abortion for a baby with Down’s Syndrome, 6 times more likely
to have an abortion for Edward’s syndrome and 4 times more likely to have one
for Patau’s syndrome.

Furthermore the Irish birth rate for Down’s syndrome babies
is about twice that for England and Wales.

The way these figures are derived is explained below. The
calculations are not simple as many babies with all these conditions are not
diagnosed until after birth.

Some of the most common congenital abnormalities accounting
for abortions in England and Wales are ‘trisomies’, in which there are three
copies of one particular chromosome rather than two.

The most common trisomies are Down's syndrome (trisomy 21), Edwards’ syndrome
(18) and Patau syndrome (13). People with DS now have an average life
expectancy of between 50 and 60 but those with ES and PS will all die in early
childhood.

The National Down Syndrome
Cytogenetic Register (NDSCR) was set up on 1 January 1989 and holds
anonymous data from all clinical cytogenetic laboratories in England and Wales
of cases of DS, ES and PS diagnosed before or after birth.

Its 2011 annual report was published in February 2013 and is available here.

It shows that in 2011 there were 931 abortions for Down’s
syndrome, 370 for Edward’s syndrome and 139 for Patau’s syndrome.

In the same year there were an
estimated 725 babies born with Down’s syndrome accounting for approximately
1 in 1,000 live births.

How do these numbers compare with Ireland where abortion for
fetal disability is currently illegal?

We know from Department
of Health Statistics that 4,149 women with Irish addresses had
abortions in Britain in 2011 as against 189,000
abortions that year involving women from England and Wales.

Just under 4.6
million lived in the Republic of Ireland in 2011 as against 56
million in England and Wales. So if Irish women were having abortions at
the same rate as English and Scottish women there would be not 4,149 a year but
over 15,500 (there were 723,913
births in England and Wales in 2011 and 74,377
in Ireland).

But what about babies with trisomy 13, 18 or 21?

According to the Department of Health Ground E abortions
(those for fetal abnormality) for the years 2007 to 2011 were 27, 29, 42, 68
and 51 respectively – a total of 217.

Of this 217, the totals for DS, ES and PS were 48, 24 and 17
– or an average of 10, 5 and 3 per year respectively.

Now for argument’s sake let’s assume the following:

1. Babies with DS, ES and PS are conceived with same
frequency in Ireland, England and Wales (not unreasonable unless mothers are
much older and therefore risk higher in England).

2. Babies with DS, ES and PS are diagnosed with the same
frequency in Ireland, England and Wales (reasonable given the similar
technology).

3. No abortions for any of these conditions take place in
Ireland (as it is illegal).

4. All abortions on Irish babies with these conditions take
place in England and Wales (as this is their nearest legal port of call).

5. The Department of Health statistics for abortions on
babies with DS, ES and PS are accurate (although see comparison with NDSCR figures here).

If abortions on Irish babies with DS, ES and OS were
occurring at the same rates as English and Welsh babies with these conditions
we would expect not 10, 5 and 3 abortions per year (for DS, ES and PS) but
rather 76, 30 and 11 (figures obtained by multiplying E/W figures of 931, 370
and 139 above by 4.6 and dividing by 56 to correct for population).

In other words English and Welsh women are 7.6 times more
likely than Irish women to have an abortion for a baby with Down’s Syndrome, 6
times more likely to have an abortion for Edward’s syndrome and 4 times more
likely to have one for Patau’s syndrome.

There are currently 60,000
people living with Down’s syndrome in England and Wales and 5,000
in Ireland – roughly similar if we correct for population size.

But whereas 120
babies are born with Down’s syndrome in Ireland every year the equivalent
figure for England and Wales is 725 –
about half the corrected Irish birth numbers of 1,460.

Discussion of the results and the derivation of the numbers
is most welcome.

Most Western countries bear testimony to the fact that the
legalisation of abortion, even in very restricted circumstances, leads
inexorably to abortion on demand.

In Britain the famous case of Rex v Bourne (R v Bourne [1938]
3 All ER 615) involved a 14 year old girl who was raped by five soldiers
and became pregnant as a result.

An eminent gynaecologist, Aleck Bourne (pictured), ended
her pregnancy and was charged with the offence of conducting an illegal
abortion.

His defence was based on the Offences against the Person Act
1861 in which, under British law, the only recognized justification
for the termination of a pregnancy was if the life of the woman was in danger

Bourne was acquitted. Mr Justice Macnaghten in his judgement
said:

‘If the doctor is of
the opinion, on reasonable grounds and with adequate knowledge, that the
probable consequence of the continuance of the pregnancy will be to make the
woman a physical or mental wreck, the jury are entitled to take the view that
the doctor is operating for the purpose of preserving the life of the mother’

This statement laid the framework for the mental health clause
of the Abortion Act 1967.

Since 1968, around eight million abortions have been
performed in Britain; now amounting to 200,000 each year, one for every four
live births.

Similarly in the US, as a result of the Roe Vs Wade case of
1973, there have been 54 million abortions; now 1.2 million per year, one for
every four live births.

The Irish ‘Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act’, signed into law last
July, will allow abortions to be carried out where there is a threat to the
life of the mother.

But it will also be allowed where there is medical consensus
that the expectant mother will take her own life over her pregnancy.

It is this latter ‘mental health’ provision that is so
easily subjective and elastic.

98% of all abortions in England and Wales are now actually
performed on mental health grounds.

‘Subject to the provisions of this section, a person shall not be guilty of
an offence under the law relating to abortion when a pregnancy is terminated by
a registered medical practitioner if two registered medical practitioners are
of the opinion, formed in good faith
that the pregnancy has not exceeded its twenty-fourth week and that the
continuance of the pregnancy would involve risk, greater than if the
pregnancy were terminated, of injury to the physical or mental health of
the pregnant woman or any existing children of her family…’

However, despite this, the police, the General Medical Council, the Crown Prosecution
Service and parliament all choose to turn a blind eye. In fact there has been only one prosecution for illegal abortion in Britain since 1967 in eight million cases.

It does not matter, in other words, what the law says. Once abortion has been legalised in any circumstances at all, it is
in practice rather a matter of how the law is
interpreted by doctors, how regulators, legislators, the police and the judiciary react, and what the public will accept.

And in practice British doctors simply tick the mental health
clause to authorise abortion on demand. They use ‘mental health’as a catch-all
for failed contraception, economic difficulty, social inconvenience and unwanted
pregnancy. And no one else does anything to stop it happening.

If a similar situation were to evolve in Ireland with its
new law (and after all any woman may threaten to commit suicide if she is not
granted an abortion and some doctors will comply by ticking the box!) then Ireland
abortion numbers could very easily follow the pattern we see in the US and UK.

How many abortions would this mean for Ireland and what sort of increase on current numbers could we see?

We know from Department
of Health Statistics that 4,149 women with Irish addresses had
abortions in Britain in 2011 as against 200,000 abortions in Britain each year
involving women from England (189,000) and Wales (12,000).

Just under 4.6 million live in the Republic of Ireland as against 60 million in
England and Wales. So if Irish women were having abortions at the same rate as
English and Scottish women there would be not 4,149 a year but over
15,300.

In other words abortion being illegal in Ireland currently saves over 11,000
Irish pre-born babies from abortion every year (This assumes that a change in
Irish law will mean that Irish abortion rates will approach British rates – a
not unreasonable assumption given how British rates have escalated in spite of
what is on the surface a very restrictive law as argued above).

The only thing that will stop Ireland following suit is if its parliament,
regulators, medical profession, judiciary and police behave differently from
those in the UK.

But if the culture and public conscience in Ireland follow
that of England and Wales – and there is no reason to think that they will not –
it would seem unlikely that this will happen.

‘Those who plead for
an extensive relaxation of the law [against abortion] have no idea of the very
many cases where a woman who, during the first three months, makes a most
impassioned appeal for her pregnancy to be “finished”, later, when the baby is
born, is thankful indeed that it was not killed while still an embryo. During
my long years in practice I have had many a letter of the deepest gratitude for
refusing to accede to an early appeal.’

Friday, 13 December 2013

The Irish ‘Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act’, signed into law last
July, will allow abortions to be carried out where there is a threat to the
life of the mother.

It does not, however, allow abortion when the life of the
baby is at risk.

Campaigners in Ireland are now seeking to change this and
are up to their usual
tricks of inflating statistics.

On 13 November the Irish Journal reported
on a campaign by a group called ‘Terminations for Medical Reasons’ (TFMR) who
argued that 1,500 Irish women per year carried babies with fatal fetal
abnormalities:

‘About 1,500 cases of
fatal fetal abnormalities are reported each year in Ireland with about 80 per
cent of the women travelling abroad for early inducement or
terminations. Members of TFMR were devastated of the omission from the
legislation this year but vowed to take their cases to Europe and beyond.’

80% of 1,500 is 1,200! Given that around 4,000 Irish women have abortions in England and Wales each year this would suggest that almost one third of them are having them for fatal fetal abnormalities. That sounds a wee bit high to me.

So where did this figure of 1,500 come from? The earliest reference
to it that I can find seems to be from the same group (TFMR) on 27 May this
year, reported in Breaking
News Ireland.

Since this time it appears to have been picked up
uncritically by the Irish media.

According to the Irish
Times on 26 June, during the debate over the bill, Independent TD John
Halligan (pictured below), ‘pointed out’ that 1,500
women in Ireland each year
had to deal with a pregnancy where the baby would live for just minutes outside the womb (emphasis mine).

The figure was repeated uncritically by the Irish
Examiner a day later.

To my knowledge not one of these news outlets has since
retracted nor corrected the claim, with the exception of the Irish Independent
who published an article
by Niamh Ui Bhriain of The Life Institute on 25 November debunking the false
statistics.

This encouraged us to obtain the statistics for Irish women
having abortions in England and Wales for fatal fetal abnormalities from the
Department of Health (DoH). According to the above there should have been 80%
of 1,500 or about 1,200 each year.

So how many were there? According to the DoH Ground E
abortions (those for fetal abnormality) for the years 2007 to 2011 were 27, 29,
42, 68 and 51 respectively.

But how many of these were for fatal abnormalities where, by John Halligan’s definition, the baby
‘would live for just minutes outside the womb’?

We are not told this specifically but we can make a reasonable estimate from the data available.

Of these the latter two conditions are very serious. Half of
infants with Edward’s
syndrome do not survive beyond the first week of life.The median lifespan
is 5–15 days. About 8% of infants survive longer than one year.

More than 80% of children with Patau’s syndrome die
within the first year of life.

Today the average life expectancy for a person with Down's
syndrome is between 50 and 60. A considerable number of people with Down's
syndrome live into their 60's.

So, even given the fact that these are all life-limiting conditions, it is
extremely unlikely that any of these 31 babies, if born, would have died within minutes of birth.

There were 12 babies aborted for a range of other conditions
including spina bifida (3) and cardiovascular disease (2). It would expected
that most of these also would not die within minutes of birth. Unlike those babies
with chromosomal abnormalities most of this group would be amenable to
treatment of one kind or another.

The only category where the babies might arguably have
fitted Halligan’s definition of ‘fatal’ was anencephaly. There were 8 abortions
on Irish women for this condition in 2011.

55% of babies with anencephaly, who are not
aborted, do not survive birth. If they are not stillborn, then they will
usually die within a few hours or days after birth from cardiorespiratory
arrest, although there are exceptional cases of babies with the condition
surviving up to two or three years.

So let’s say that about half of those with anencephaly,
about 4 in 2011, would fall into Halligan’s category of being stillborn or
dying within minutes of birth.

That’s four versus Halligan’s figure of 1,200. So the TD was
out by a factor of 300!

I am not in any way trying to suggest that carrying a baby that has a disability to term is not a huge challenge which requires great
courage, grace and support (see my article on anencephaly here).

But if we are to have this debate at all, then we must have
it based on the actual facts of the case, and not with reference to wildly spun
statistics that have been simply plucked out of the air to advance a certain political
agenda.

Telling lies in parliament is serious. If John Halligan
didn’t know they were lies then he is rather gullible and probably also
incompetent. If he did then it is a very serious matter indeed.

I wonder if he will be called to account for it? And I wonder if the Irish media will keep propagating his untruths?

Monday, 9 December 2013

New Zealand may not have a very good cricket team but in
addition to the world rugby rankings there is another ladder on which it is
consistently on the highest few rungs – and quite often top.

Yes New Zealand is one of the least corrupt countries in the
world!

Since 1995, Transparency International (TI) has
published the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI)
annually ranking countries ‘by their perceived levels of corruption, as
determined by expert assessments and opinion surveys.’

The CPI generally defines corruption as ‘the misuse of
public power for private benefit’.

The CPI currently ranks 176 countries ‘on a scale from 100
(very clean) to 0 (highly corrupt).’ The 2013 ranking is here and
illustrated above. The more yellow the less corrupt; the more red the more
corrupt.

Well, now that I have taken the opportunity to plug New
Zealand, it so happens that today is International Anti-Corruption Day and
there is a chance to put your signature to a petition against
corruption. It only takes a minute.

The campaign is being run by Micah Challenge and I have
pasted the letter from director Joel Edwards below.

Today is International Anti-Corruption Day and a chance
for Christians around the world to shine a light on the scourge of corruption.
Jesus came into a world of greed and corruption to turn it upside down - and I
believe he wants the Church to do the same.

The reality is that today over 1 billion people live on
the edge of survival with poor sanitation, no healthcare and little chance of
education. There are many causes for poverty but the single greatest obstacle
to overcoming this crippling poverty is corruption.

Every day well over $3 billion goes missing from the
global economy - stolen through bribes, money laundering, tax evasion and other
illegal payments in business and government. Money lost through bribery alone
adds up to $1 trillion in a year [1]. This affects us all but it’s the world's
poorest who suffer most. This is more than just a depressing statistic; it's
devastating. Corruption kills. A recent report from Christian Aid estimates
that if we addressed illegal corporate tax evasion we could save the lives of
230 children under the age of 5 every single day [2].

That's why we at Micah Challenge are part of EXPOSED,
which we believe to be the first ever global campaign by Christians to stand
for integrity and honesty in financial dealings in business, government and
church. Corruption leads to injustice and broken relationships, while the Bible
calls us to restore relationships with each other and with God.

Today I'd like to ask that you join us in calling on the
leaders of the world’s powerful nations (the G20) to step up efforts to combat
bribery and tax avoidance. Governments are already considering anti-corruption
measures and we can encourage them to ensure tighter systems are in place to
plug the holes in financial flows, making it harder for corrupt practices to
flourish.

We really need your voice to help shine a light on
corruption and protect the poorest in our world.

For many Christians around the world speaking out against
corruption is not a safe option - Pope Francis himself was named a mafia target
after making a strident assault on corruption and bribery during a recent
Monday morning mass. But there are positive signs of hope. As Joyce Thong who
heads up the Malaysian EXPOSED programme reported: ‘It is risky to speak out,
and the problem of corruption is overwhelming but I have never seen the Church
so receptive, so ready to act.’

The more we join together in speaking out to governments,
the greater the impact we have. We need 50,000 signatures on our global
petition by Christmas and are aiming for a million by June next year as we
prepare to hand over our petition with a whole host of churches and NGOs.
Please join your light and stand with thousands of others around the world. It
only takes a minute to sign the petition, but your voice is important.

Saturday, 7 December 2013

Nelson
Mandela’s achievements were monumental but the way that politicians and media
commentators have seized upon his passing to outdo one another in their adulation of
him is most unfortunate.

Peter
Oborne, the Daily Telegraph's chief political commentator, possibly takes
the biscuit with this quote from yesterday:

‘There
are very few human beings who can be compared to Jesus Christ. Nelson Mandela
is one. This is because he was a spiritual leader as much as a statesman. His
colossal moral strength enabled him to embark on new and unimaginable forms of
action. He could lead through the strength of example alone.’

This
morning, on the BBC Radio Four Today programme, presenter Justin Webb appeared to pick up on
this by posing the following question (listen here) to former US president
Jimmy Carter:

‘Some
people have compared Nelson Mandela with Jesus. You’re a religious man. Would
you?’

Carter’s
reply was decisive.

‘No
I would not go that far. I’m a Christian. I look upon Jesus Christ as the Son
of God, as God himself, and I certainly wouldn’t compare any human being with
Jesus.’

He
then went on to pay tribute to Martin Luther King and Mother Theresa before
reemphasising his point:

‘I
wouldn’t compare any other human being with Jesus Christ.’

It
seems that Mandela himself shared this view. Scottish minister David Robertson
gave one of his favourite Mandela quotes on his Facebook page this
morning:

‘The
Good News borne by our risen Messiah who chose not one race, who chose not one
country, who chose not one language, who chose not one tribe, who chose all of
humankind... Our Messiah, whose life bears testimony to the truth that there is
no shame in poverty: Those who should be ashamed are they who impoverish
others.’

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher once replied to
a nine year old child who had asked her about Jesus:

‘However good we try to be, we can never be as
kind, gentle and wise as Jesus… There will be times when we say or do something
we wish we hadn’t done and we shall be sorry and try not to do it again! We do
our best, but our best is not as good as his daily life. If you and I were to
paint a picture it wouldn’t be as good as the picture of great artists. No our
lives can’t be as good as the life of Jesus.’

Carter,
Thatcher and Mandela himself seem to have to latched onto a deeper understanding
of Jesus than Oborne.

The
reality is that, unlike Mandela, Jesus did not seek to ‘lead by example’ or to
start a political or even a spiritual movement. He also did not die to win a
political victory.

Although
his life has motivated many great social reformers he did not come to build a
kingdom on earth but to offer us God’s forgiveness and new life for all
eternity.

His
aim was not to empty prisons but to empty graveyards.

And perhaps most importantly, unlike Mandela as the great man himself recognised in the quote above, Jesus rose from the dead!

On the day of judgement it will be Jesus who sits on the throne. And Nelson Mandela, like all of us, will be on our faces before him.

Perhaps
the last words should belong to the Apostle John, one of the three people on
earth who knew Jesus best:

‘In
the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…The
Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the
glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and
truth… Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which
are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may
believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing
you may have life in his name.’ (John 1:1,14, 20:30,31)

Thursday, 5 December 2013

Northern Ireland's
justice minister has said he
is going to consult on changing abortion laws to allow women carrying babies
with ‘fatal fetal abnormalities’ to have a termination.

David Ford said he hoped to put out a consultation document
for the ‘potential for change’ by next Easter.

The minister told BBC Radio Ulster's Nolan Show he would
review the legislation after two women told their stories earlier this year
about discovering that their babies had anencephaly,
a severe brain abnormality.

The British Abortion Act 1967 does not apply in Northern
Ireland which is governed by the 1861 Offences against the Person Act, and the Criminal Justice Act 1945.

These laws only allow terminations to save a woman's life, or if there is a
risk of permanent and serious damage to her mental or physical health.

Very few abortions are carried out on these grounds in Northern Ireland
itself. Over the years 2006-7 to 2011-2 the annual figures were
respectively 57, 47, 44, 36, 43 and 35.

Women from Northern Ireland do however come to the British
mainland to have abortions. In 2012, for example, there were 905 abortions
carried out on Northern Ireland residents in England and Wales (see table 12a here).

But according to the Department of Health only two of
these were for fetal disability. This is because very few women in Northern Ireland carrying
babies with fetal disability choose to abort their babies.

On 3 December, in response to a parliamentary question (see
page 31 here),
Edwin Poots, Minister of Health, Social
Services and Public Safety, said he had received a vast amount of
correspondence from women carrying babies with severe disabilities, many of
whom had made the decision to proceed with the pregnancy. ‘They received real
value from going ahead with the pregnancy’, he said.

It is often
assumed that women will naturally choose to abort a baby with a serious
disability, but the Northern Irish experience shows that this is in fact often
not the case.

We see a
similar pattern in the Republic of Ireland where an article
in the Irish Independent last week reported that only 51 abortions per year
took place on Irish women in 2011 in England and Wales for fetal disability. Of these I have ascertained that the majority were for non-fatal abnormalities and only eight were for anencephaly.

But while
90% of Irish mothers or families
facing this issue do not abort their babies, inBritain, up to 90% do.

In fact between2002 and 2010 there were 17,983 abortions of disabled babies in Britain.
The overwhelming majority of these were for conditions compatible with life
outside the womb and 1,189 babies were aborted after 24 weeks, the accepted age
of viability.

This 17,983
included abortions for serious disabilities like anencephaly but also babies
with Down’s syndrome, cleft palate and club foot.

It is an old legal adage that hard cases make bad law. This is because
making exceptions in law for difficult cases inevitably leads to incremental
extension to less serious cases and also a change in the public conscience.

Presently the law in Northern Ireland offers legal protection to babies with
disability. But were it to change, even for extreme cases, the British
experience demonstrates how things would quickly escalate and how public attitudes would change (I have previously documented the frightening attitudes to disability amongst the British public).

Furthermore, contrary to public perception, the psychological trauma for women having abortions for
fetal disability is often very
significant.

Northern
Ireland currently has a law which protects disabled babies and allows abortion
only when the mother’s life or health is under very serious threat. It already
has built into it the provision for judges and prosecutors to temper justice
with mercy in hard cases.

Friday, 29 November 2013

A new website, containing articles, videos and personal
stories has been launched today to help Christians experiencing same-sex
attraction.

Living Out is a
brilliant initiative by men in pastoral ministry who admit to feelings of same
sex attraction but who also see the Bible’s
prohibitions on same-sex relationships as non-negotiable.

The core of the new group, recently interviewed by Christianity
magazine, are Sam Alberry, a church leader in Maidenhead, Sean Doherty, a tutor
at St Mellitus College and Ed Shaw, who helps to lead Emmanuel Church in
Bristol.

Their testimonies are clear, powerful, hugely encouraging
and most welcome at a time when many young evangelicals are genuinely
confused about the issue.

Doherty, who has experienced some degree of shift in his
sexual feelings and is now married, explains how his own church experience
helped him:

‘Church was a place of nurture and unconditional
acceptance, but at the same time the teaching was clear that I shouldn’t act on
those sexual desires. In an environment where young people were being
encouraged to experiment, I was really grateful that I had been kept from acting
on my feelings.’

He is reluctant to describe himself as gay and instead
adopts terminology adopted by blogger Peter
Ould who has a similar testimony:

‘I don’t speak of myself as an “ex-gay” person. I prefer
the term “post-gay”. You choose to move away from the label of “gay”
altogether, which has come to be associated with a certain lifestyle. I’ve
clearly experienced some change in my feelings so that I am attracted to my
wife. But it’s definitely not a 180-degree reorientation. All of us will
continue to have desires and feelings which aren’t right, until Jesus returns.’

Alberry and Shaw share Doherty’s perspective, but accept
that they will remain celibate if their orientation does not change.

Alberry previously posted an article titled ‘How
can the Gospel be good news to gays?’ on the Gospel Coalition website,
where he takes a firm biblical stance on the issue but argues strongly and
compassionately that people with homosexual orientation need more grace and not
less.

Last year Vaughan Roberts, a leading conservative
evangelical, spoke
for the first time of his own struggle with same-sex attraction in an
interview with Evangelicals Now. His testimony is clear,
biblical, passionate and pastoral and well worthy of study.

Alberry, Doherty and Shaw's experience, and those of Ould
and Roberts, underline the fact that there is a
difference between experiencing same sex attraction and choosing to
participate in homosexual erotic behaviour.

The Bible is very clear that all sexual relations outside
marriage (a life-long exclusive monogamous heterosexual public covenant
relationship) are morally wrong (Leviticus 18:6-23, 20:10-21; Romans 1:26, 27;
1 Corinthians 6:9,10; Colossians 3:5; 1 Thessalonians 4:3; 1 Timothy 1:9,10;
Revelation 22:15). This includes fornication, adultery, same-sex relations and
all other sorts of sex imaginable, even if you are deeply in love with
the other person.

Claiming that we are just ‘being true to our feelings’ in this area is just as
wrong as claiming that our feelings justify any other form of sin. As Jeremiah
put it ‘the heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure’ (17:9) It is
God’s Word that must guide us, not our feelings.

So people who become Christians, who recognize that they experience same-sex feelings
or have a homosexual orientation and/or identity, are in the same category as
anyone who has opposite-sex feelings but is unmarried,
divorced, widowed or in a marriage relationship where, for physical or
psychosexual reasons, sex is not possible.

For those who recognize themselves to be exclusively of homosexual orientation
this may well mean that the only course open to them is staying single.
Sometimes sexual orientation may change over time, but often it doesn’t.

Jesus of course was unmarried and never had sex yet we know that he ‘was
tempted in all ways as we are – yet was without sin’. This must surely have
included the temptation to sexual sin.

Is it possible to live a full life without having sex? Well Jesus himself did
just that. And he is able to help any Christian to do the same. Marriage is a
great calling but so is singleness, and sex is neither compulsory, nor
necessary, in order to live a fulfilled and fruitful life. Jesus also said that
there would be no marriage (and therefore sex) in heaven.

Sex is a wonderful gift but like any gift it is not granted to all.

This is where God's grace becomes evident. God never allows us to face a temptation that he does not give us the power to resist. Nor does he ever give us a command that he does not also grant the power to obey. And for those who, for any reason, can’t have sex, he grants other good gifts to enjoy.

The powerful testimonies on this new website demonstrate the goodness of God, the wisdom of his pattern for our lives and also the fact that he grants his grace and power to enable us to live in ways which are both fulfilling and also pleasing to him.

For a list of helpful resources for those seeking an
evangelical Christian perspective on homosexuality see my earlier
blog.

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Kiwi, Christian and Medical

This blog deals mainly with matters at the interface of Christianity and Medicine. But I do also diverge into other subjects - especially New Zealand, rugby, economics, developing world, politics and topics of general Christian and/or medical interest. The opinions expressed here are mine and may not necessarily reflect the views of my employer or anyone else associated with me.

About Me

I am CEO of Christian Medical Fellowship, a UK-based organisation with 4,500 UK doctors and 1,000 medical students as members. The opinions expressed here however are mine, and may not necessarily reflect the views of CMF or anyone else associated with me.